sexing Rinkhals

[Niels v.d. H.]

Hello forumpeople,
I have two rinkhals (bought als 1.1.), but I'm not sure anymore. A friend of my and myself have probe the snakes today, but we are not sure (the results of probing I will tell you guys later, so it would not infuence your decision).
Maybe some Rinkhals enthousiast can help me out?

Rinkhals 1:






Rinkhals 2:






Thank you in forward for the repleys!
Cheers,
Niels

Moved

[steve]

Rinkhals 1: female

Rinkhals 2: male

otherwise 2 males.

my guess is a good as yours though.
cheers

[Bushviper]

Black and white rinkhals looks like a male to me. The black and orange looks like it could also be male although the tail does taper rather quickly and looks thin. They are pretty easy to probe. I have an idea you are in the market for a female?

[MrG]

To me it looks like you have 2 males.

[Masticophis]

Rinkhals 1: female

Rinkhals 2: male

otherwise 2 males.

my guess is a good as yours though.
cheers

Black and white rinkhals looks like a male to me. The black and orange looks like it could also be male although the tail does taper rather quickly and looks thin. They are pretty easy to probe. I have an idea you are in the market for a female?

To me it looks like you have 2 males.

Hi,

How sure are you about it? Any chance they are both females Or did we just probe them to carefully?
I thought that the first one was sold as a male, isn't it Niels?

kind regards

Gilian

[Bushviper]

This is from Fitzsimons Snakes of Southern Africa by Don Broadley. Ventral scale counts on 119-124 in males and 126 -130 in females. Subcaudals 34 -38 in males and 30 -37 in females. Hemipenes extend backwards to level of the 12 th subcaudal bifurcating at the 5 th subcaudal. It also says Length of the tail contained in total length 5.2 -6.6 times usually under 6 times in males and 6 or over in females.

If you can get them onto a glass table and photograph them from below or scan and photostat them then you can do the counts required.

I will photograph and probe some rinkhals tomorrow and then I will check what I can find about probing depths and shape of the tails. I unfortunately only have one orange banded rinkhals and one grey banded besides the normal black ones. I will check them all for you.

[Niels v.d. H.]

Rinkhals 1: female

Rinkhals 2: male

otherwise 2 males.

my guess is a good as yours though.
cheers

Black and white rinkhals looks like a male to me. The black and orange looks like it could also be male although the tail does taper rather quickly and looks thin. They are pretty easy to probe. I have an idea you are in the market for a female?

To me it looks like you have 2 males.

Hi,

How sure are you about it? Any chance they are both females Or did we just probe them to carefully?
I thought that the first one was sold as a male, isn't it Niels?

kind regards

Gilian

First of all, thank you for the anwsers.
Indeed, the first one is sold as a male and the second one for a female.
We came to two scales with probing.

This is from Fitzsimons Snakes of Southern Africa by Don Broadley. Ventral scale counts on 119-124 in males and 126 -130 in females. Subcaudals 34 -38 in males and 30 -37 in females. Hemipenes extend backwards to level of the 12 th subcaudal bifurcating at the 5 th subcaudal. It also says Length of the tail contained in total length 5.2 -6.6 times usually under 6 times in males and 6 or over in females.

If you can get them onto a glass table and photograph them from below or scan and photostat them then you can do the counts required.

I will photograph and probe some rinkhals tomorrow and then I will check what I can find about probing depths and shape of the tails. I unfortunately only have one orange banded rinkhals and one grey banded besides the normal black ones. I will check them all for you.

Thanks for the info!
I will take some new pictures in the near future and I will post them in this topic!
Cheers,
Niels

[Bushviper]

I am sorry to bring you bad news. After looking carefully at some that I have I was rather surprised.


Female (rather long tail)

and then

Male (he looked like a male though)

and

Male as expected
and

Female (almost 4 subcaudals)

and

Male (fairly well endowed)

and

Yellow banded male as expected but .... look at this ......

His first 3 subcaudals are not paired and then I looked in the Fitzsimons and it says the first 3 or 4 subcaudals are often entire!

Your two are probably female because the males probe so easily especially with a small diameter probe. The good thing is that males are easy to get and females are very scarce.

[Niels v.d. H.]

Thank you very much Mr. Bushviper!

I am sorry to bring you bad news.
That's good news, better two females than two males
Your two are probably female because the males probe so easily especially with a small diameter probe. The good thing is that males are easy to get and females are very scarce.

We probed with thin probes, but we couldn't pass the 2 scales!
Again, thanks alot for the advice and pictures!

Cheers,
Niels

[Bob H]

Great pictures Bushviper....and very informative. Those males really probe deeply.

[Bushviper]

Bob H I never pushed on the probes and gently twirl the probes while holding them loosely and they go that deep. I was rather surprised as well. The size and shape of the tails are not that easy to distinguish like with the true cobras. Once you see the tails and the probes then your eye gets tuned in to that but otherwise I guess that is why we all made fools of ourselves with the initial post. What was that saying about never assume ......

[Loslappie]

[quote="Bushviper"]The size and shape of the tails are not that easy to distinguish like with the true cobras. quote]

BV, I dont know hey, Ive been trying to get my head around the whole probing issue, and I get the feeling I will stuff it up completely! an avenue that i have been exploring (and I think Ive read it here somewhere just cant find the thread) is determining the sex of a snake by scale count, can it be done and how accurate can that be?

[Bushviper]

Loslappie it is possible to determine sex by counting subcaudal scales on certain species. On some species it is possible by counting ventral scales !!!! I was amazed by this too.

On Cape house snakes for example it is quite clear cut with anything more than 56 pairs being male and anything below 56 being female. However if it has 56 on the dot then probing is the only solution. On Lebombo shieldnose (Aspidelaps .s. intermedius) males have 32 or more subcaudals and females have 31 or less subcaudals. However the males have 108 - 113 ventrals and females have 117 -121 ventrals so counting these would give a better indication of the sexes.

If you take the Long tailed garter snake (E. s. longicauda) there the males have 21 -33 subcaudals and females have 24 - 28. So a specimen which has 24 - 28 subcaudals could be either sex and females could have longer tails than males. The ventrals are 164 - 179 in males and only 148-156 in females so it would be far better to count ventrals. A week ago a friend brought be one of the garter snakes which he had just acquired. It was supposed to be a female and had a short tail. For a snake called a long tailed garter snake I assumed it was a female. While palpating the tail I felt it was "squishy" and with only a slight bit of pressure out popped two hemipenes.

This system is great when there are no overlaps and means you can sex your snake by counting the scales when it sheds. This is often safer and more reliable especially when it is a dangerous, nervous or valuable snake. If you are not confident of your sexing methods this can also be used. In snakes like baby corn snakes it is possible to take the shedded skin and either scan and enlarge or photograph the tail and when it is enlarged you can count the scales easily. It is also possible to scan the live snake as long as it lies still. This can be achieved by placing it under a heavy cloth and hoping it feels secure.

PS I dont have the scale counts for all the species and it would entail a bit of research to get these counts. The late JP le Brun had scale counts for many exotic species and watching him confirm sexes by staring at the snake's tails was amusing. Certain breeders and snake park owners would not allow us to sex the snakes for fear of us injuring them and then not taking them. Not being allowed to do any popping or probing does reduce your chances of getting pairs. By using this method we could get pairs of most of the species we required. Unfortunately after his murder this information was lost.

If anyone would like to make this their pet project we will provide the place for it. By just counting scales on the snakes they have and on which the sexes are confirmed we can build up our own database. Subcaudal scales are counted by marking off the scales one side of the tail (not both sides in the case of paired subcaudals). Ventrals start under the chin and go all the way down but exclude the anal plate.

[Loslappie]

Thanks for that BV!!
Very interesting, Im very hesitant to pop a small snake, and while I know probing is probably the best option when done by a person who knows what he/she is doing, Im just not comfortable with it. so counting scales to me would be a much better option.

[Bushviper]

Loslappie it looks as if I will be doing a husbandry course in Cape Town in a few months and there I can teach you how to sex snakes if you are interested. It is supposed to be aimed at pet shops but anybody can attend. I might do one in the week and one over a weekend to accomodate more people. I will keep you posted.